Breaking the 'Be Nice' Rule in the Energy Family

By Jeffrey H. Birnbaum
Tuesday, April 22, 2008

To everyone feeling glum about $3.50-a-gallon gasoline, here's some good news: The fat-and-happy energy industry is fighting with itself.

A new natural gas organization called the American Clean Skies Foundation has riled all sorts of energy interests, including producers of coal, oil and even natural gas. Its critics have accused the multimillion-dollar foundation -- bankrolled by Oklahoma billionaire Aubrey K. McClendon-- of trying to snatch customers for natural gas away from other forms of energy.

That's a no-no in the close-knit energy world.

The dispute erupted a year ago when the Natural Gas Council, whose members include such energy lobby mainstays as the American Petroleum Institute and the American Gas Association, wrote to lawmakers to distance itself from ads purchased by a McClendon-backed group. The ads' theme: "Face it: Coal is filthy."

The council said the ads "have been characterized as an effort by the natural gas industry to capture market share from coal." In fact, they explained, "They were not purchased by the natural gas industry and were not developed with the knowledge of the industry."

The ads did not appear again, and McClendon, who heads a major natural gas company, went on to create the foundation.

In February, the same controversy reemerged. Denise A. Bode, the foundation's chief executive, wrote a piece in the Hill newspaper that again read like an attack on coal. It congratulated the Energy Department for canceling funding for a low-emission, coal-based power plant and suggested that the Bush administration end its backing for "clean coal" technology.

Kraig R. Naasz, president of the National Mining Association, immediately wrote to Bode. He called her article "a diatribe against coal" that "marks a disturbing departure from the understanding we tacitly share in the energy industries to avoid denigrating competing fuels."

Asked about the foundation, a spokeswoman for the American Petroleum Institute added, "Our country needs all forms of energy; we can't afford to leave any out."

Bode and McClendon have been busy meeting with energy lobbies to reassure them that they plan to say only positive things about gas and nothing nasty about any other forms of energy. But Bode said, "We probably had some false starts in our messaging earlier this year."

Nice.

Of Grunge and Voting

Krist Novoselic is best known as the bassist in the groundbreaking rock band Nirvana. But he recently added another title: chairman.

Novoselic has replaced former congressman John B. Anderson (R-Ill.) as chairman of FairVote, a group that advocates ways to encourage voting. Anderson comes from a different realm entirely; he was an independent candidate for president in 1980.

The transition is not as strange as it seems. In 2004, Novoselic did a national tour with FairVote to promote his book "Of Grunge & Government: Let's Fix This Broken Democracy!" In the book, Novoselic discusses how Nirvana emerged as the biggest band of the early 1990s and how he became involved in politics.

On second thought, it does seem pretty strange. In addition to chairing FairVote, Novoselic now plays with a punk band called Flipper.

Taking Credit

Sen. Carl M. Levin (D-Mich.) contacted his supporters the other day to complain about shady practices by firms that issue credit cards.

"Abusive practices by credit card companies are widespread, well-entrenched and unlikely to end without a legislative ban," he wrote in an e-mail. He then touted a bill he introduced, the "Stop Unfair Practices in Credit Cards Act."

At the bottom of the note, he included a place to click in order to donate to his campaign. And the way people are asked to contribute?

By credit card, of course.

A spokeswoman for Levin said that "like most Americans, Senator Levin appreciates the convenience of charging purchases to credit cards. What he objects to are the abusive practices used by some credit card companies at the expense of consumers."

Gambling on Democracy

The Poker Players Alliance is about to make a big bet on the upcoming elections. The two-year-old lobby, which has nearly 250,000 paid members, is forming a political action committee, PokerPAC.

It is also initiating a voter registration drive. Its "If You Play, Have a Say" campaign will feature voter registration efforts in battleground states as well as during the 2008 World Series of Poker, which will begin next month in Las Vegas.

And that's no bluff.

Homemaker Update

A few weeks ago, I wrote about Todd Goldup, a candidate for the House from New York who wanted to pay himself a salary out of campaign funds even though he hasn't been earning any money otherwise. Goldup had no income last year because he's a stay-at-home father to his two young children.

Well, last week the Federal Election Commission gave him his answer: No way. In informal guidance, the agency said Goldup was not eligible for a salary since he had none before. Such payments have to be comparable to the income a candidate forfeits in order to run for office, the FEC has said.

But Goldup can pay for child care and auto expenses with campaign money, which ought to soften the blow.

Not everyone saw that as fair. "Hopefully, when the FEC has a quorum again they will revisit this issue and reach the obviously correct conclusion," said Melanie Sloan of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington. "Any homemaker, regardless of outside earned income, is worth way more than any member of Congress."

Departure of the Week

Robert D. Blackwill, 67, former U.S. ambassador to India and once President Bush's special envoy to Iraq, is leaving the lobbying firm BGR Holding and heading to Rand.

"While I have had a terrific nearly four year experience in the private sector," Blackwill wrote to friends, "I now feel the compelling need for sustained time to reflect and write about America's role in the world in this difficult and dangerous period."

Hire of the Week

It's easy to imagine the American Library Association as a milquetoast lobby. But that would be wrong.

ALA is the world's oldest and largest library association, with more than 66,000 members. Its headquarters in Chicago has a staff of 250. Its Washington office, which was opened in 1945, consists of a lobbying division (the Office of Government Relations) and a policy think tank (the Office for Information Technology Policy).

What's more, the lobby shop has five full-time lobbyists. Its newest hire: Corey D. Williams Green, 34, who previously worked as assistant to the president of the University of Maryland Baltimore County.

Don't mess with librarians.